Seeing Fatherlessness From the Other Side

We lingered in the kitchen a bit longer then the rest. Just the three of us, me and these dads.

We had just stood up from praying, interceding on behalf of my friend who lost a baby and his brother in need of a job. We are the body, even here in this office. Even here in the middle of the business world, with all of it's bidding and deception and hunger and gain. I see the Bride getting ready—oh glorious day. And it's not all ugly, not like I thought.

He was filling up his coffee mug and he turned to us just a little more angled and his face took on a gaze, ever distant.

Pray for my kids please. I haven't seen them in two years. And I really miss them, but they don't want anything to do with me. 

The depth of his eyes shed tears untouched and pain that has yet to simmer away.

My heart does a little jump and I wonder about him now, the man behind the glasses. I didn't know the burden he bore. I didn't know about these kids of whom he spoke. I didn't know. I missed the pain and the anger and the regret. I lost sight of the bride inside the business.

I am still and listening and the other dad, he pipes in. Yeah, mine moved out a few months ago and I am just so frustrated with her. I want her to come back and yet I'm mad too. 

She moved out? I didn't even know until now, months into the turmoil. I am quiet. 

At least 75% of the girls in my life stand beside me in this fatherless generation—and there is hope in the Abba Father, the one who adopts even the fatherless, even the fathers.

But it is not often I give much thought to the dads that make us girls without earthly fathers. Until now. And maybe we change the focus from cleaning up the devastation of the fatherless one to preventing it in the first place?

Maybe, the fight for the fatherless generation starts with the father?

What do we do to engage the men of this generation in the battle? How do we enable them to recognize the battle that rages and the weight of their role in it?

We can’t change the past—but the future, well the future is me and you, it’s us. It’s our brothers and our nephews. It’s our husbands and fellow youth guys. It’s our grandsons and our sons. It's our co-workers. We are the bride and He is coming for us, soon I hope. This is where it changes. It matters.

Today my big sis found out she is having twin BOYS! She told me about the blessing it is, that she gets to raise up godly men, the weight and responsibility, but the gift. She get's it—she is fighting in her own way. Moms of boys, raise up godly men.

What does that look like for the rest of us? Us 20-something, single, fatherless women? The grandmas and moms? The wives and the sisters, just as broken and unsure as the rest of us?

I know that God is sovereign and perfect as my Father. But dang it, life sure would have been far less painful, far more right if I had a dad who loved the Lord and raised me up like a dad is called to in scripture. Granted, the past is the past and I am daily thankful for it, pain, sin, struggles and all because it led me straight into the arms of a perfect Daddy to whom I cry out Abba Father. I am thankful that He restores the years the locusts have stolen too—that He is doing that through my adopted dad even right now.

But would I wish my journey, my daddy issues, my hurt, my decisions, my rebellion, my struggle to submit and trust, my daddy hole upon the next generation of young women? Heck no.

James reminds us to be doers of the Word and not hearers only, deceiving ourselves.

So, ladies…what is our role?